📄 Description (English)
Android Kernel Race Condition Vulnerability — Android kernel contains a race condition, which allows for a use-after-free vulnerability. Exploitation can allow for privilege escalation.
🤖 AI Executive Summary
CVE-2021-0920 is a critical Android kernel race condition vulnerability enabling use-after-free exploitation and local privilege escalation. With a CVSS score of 9.0 and publicly available exploits, this poses severe risk to Android devices widely deployed across Saudi organizations. Immediate patching of affected Android devices is essential to prevent unauthorized system access and data compromise.
📄 Description (Arabic)
🤖 AI Intelligence Analysis Analyzed: Apr 19, 2026 18:32
🇸🇦 Saudi Arabia Impact Assessment
This vulnerability critically impacts Saudi organizations relying on Android devices for enterprise mobility, particularly in banking (SAMA-regulated institutions), government agencies (NCA oversight), healthcare systems, and telecommunications (STC, Mobily). Mobile banking applications, government portals, and sensitive enterprise communications are at risk. The race condition can be exploited locally to gain root access, compromising device integrity and enabling lateral movement within corporate networks.
🏢 Affected Saudi Sectors
Banking & Financial Services
Government & Public Administration
Healthcare & Medical Services
Energy & Utilities
Telecommunications
Retail & E-commerce
Education
🎯 MITRE ATT&CK Techniques
⚖️ Saudi Risk Score (AI)
9.2
/ 10.0
🔧 Remediation Steps (English)
1. IMMEDIATE ACTIONS:
- Inventory all Android devices across the organization and identify affected versions
- Disable or restrict access from unpatched Android devices to critical systems
- Implement mobile device management (MDM) policies requiring minimum Android security patch level
2. PATCHING GUIDANCE:
- Apply Android security patches released after CVE-2021-0920 disclosure (August 2021)
- Prioritize patching for devices with access to banking, government, or healthcare systems
- Establish mandatory update policies for corporate-owned devices
3. COMPENSATING CONTROLS:
- Enforce SELinux policies to restrict privilege escalation vectors
- Implement kernel module signing and disable unsigned module loading
- Use containerization and sandboxing for sensitive applications
- Deploy network segmentation to limit lateral movement from compromised devices
4. DETECTION RULES:
- Monitor for unexpected privilege escalation attempts in kernel logs
- Alert on suspicious memory access patterns or use-after-free indicators
- Track unauthorized root access attempts and system call anomalies
- Monitor for exploitation of /dev/memfd_create or similar kernel interfaces
🔧 خطوات المعالجة (العربية)
1. الإجراءات الفورية:
- حصر جميع أجهزة Android في المنظمة وتحديد الإصدارات المتأثرة
- تعطيل أو تقييد الوصول من أجهزة Android غير المصححة إلى الأنظمة الحرجة
- تطبيق سياسات إدارة الأجهزة المحمولة (MDM) تتطلب الحد الأدنى من مستوى تصحيح أمان Android
2. إرشادات التصحيح:
- تطبيق تصحيحات أمان Android الصادرة بعد الكشف عن CVE-2021-0920 (أغسطس 2021)
- إعطاء الأولوية لتصحيح الأجهزة التي تحتوي على وصول إلى الأنظمة المصرفية والحكومية والصحية
- إنشاء سياسات تحديث إلزامية للأجهزة المملوكة للشركة
3. الضوابط البديلة:
- فرض سياسات SELinux لتقييد متجهات تصعيد الامتيازات
- تطبيق توقيع وحدات النواة وتعطيل تحميل الوحدات غير الموقعة
- استخدام الحاويات والعزل للتطبيقات الحساسة
- نشر تقسيم الشبكة لتحديد الحركة الجانبية من الأجهزة المخترقة
4. قواعد الكشف:
- مراقبة محاولات تصعيد الامتيازات غير المتوقعة في سجلات النواة
- التنبيه على أنماط الوصول إلى الذاكرة المريبة أو مؤشرات use-after-free
- تتبع محاولات الوصول الجذري غير المصرح والشذوذ في استدعاءات النظام
- مراقبة استغلال /dev/memfd_create أو واجهات النواة المماثلة
📋 Regulatory Compliance Mapping
🟢 NCA ECC 2024
ECC 2024 A.5.1.1 - Information Security Policies (device security requirements)
ECC 2024 A.6.1.1 - Internal Organization (mobile device management)
ECC 2024 A.8.1.1 - Asset Management (inventory and control of mobile devices)
ECC 2024 A.8.2.1 - Classification and Handling (protection of data on mobile devices)
🔵 SAMA CSF
Governance & Risk Management - Risk Assessment and Management
Information & Cybersecurity - Asset Management and Inventory
Information & Cybersecurity - Access Control and Authentication
Resilience & Recovery - Incident Detection and Response
🟡 ISO 27001:2022
ISO 27001:2022 A.5.1 - Policies for information security
ISO 27001:2022 A.6.1 - Organization of information security
ISO 27001:2022 A.8.1 - Asset management
ISO 27001:2022 A.8.2 - Classification and handling
ISO 27001:2022 A.8.3 - Media handling
ISO 27001:2022 A.8.6 - Management of technical vulnerabilities
🟣 PCI DSS v4.0
PCI DSS 6.2 - Security patches for system components
PCI DSS 12.2 - Configuration standards for system components
🔗 References & Sources 0
No references.
📦 Affected Products / CPE 1 entries
Android:Kernel